Why I’ve Been Thinking a Lot About ‘Groundhog Day’ Recently | Sojourners

Why I’ve Been Thinking a Lot About ‘Groundhog Day’ Recently

Phil Connors was forced to relive Feb. 2 on an endless loop. But the movie’s message is more hopeful than a recurring nightmare.
From Groundhog Day
From Groundhog Day / Photo 12 / Alamy

I’VE BEEN THINKING about the 1993 comedy Groundhog Day a lot since the beginning of the second Trump presidency. Like Bill Murray’s disgruntled TV weatherman Phil Connors, who’s forced to relive Feb. 2 on an unending loop, many of us feel like we’re reliving a nightmare. We find ourselves taking steps backward from progress we thought was permanent. Like Phil, we’re battling the feeling that no matter what we do, nothing will change.

However, being stuck in a moment you want to leave behind is only Groundhog Day’s setup, not its message. In a world where our individual actions don’t seem to change anything, Groundhog Day reminds me why helping others still matters.

When we meet Phil, he’s whining about making the annual trip from his station in Pittsburgh to Punxsutawney, Pa., to cover the groundhog festival. The trip is beneath him, he thinks. When a snowstorm strands Phil and the news team in Punxsutawney overnight, it seems like the ultimate insult — until Phil wakes up the next day and discovers he’s reliving events all over again. And again.

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Illustration of Barbara Taylor Brown with a farmscape superimposed onto her shirt.
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